Plain and Simple for Aug. 7, 2014

By Clyde M. DeLoach

SoVaNow.com / August 07, 2014

I saw an amazing video on Facebook this morning. It was an experiment that was set up to see how generous people were. In the first phase, this young man went to patrons in a mall food court and asked them for something to eat. He was an attractive white man and was dressed in decent clothes. He was polite and told each person that he was hungry and asked for something to eat. It was clear that each person had something they could share. The answer was always, “No.”

The next setup involved a couple of homeless men who were found sleeping or sitting on the ground outside. The first man was approached and given a big bag of McDonald’s food. He was grateful and began to eat. Then the same young man came up to him and asked for food. Without hesitation, the homeless man shared with him. The next homeless man was given food and money. The same young man came up and was given some food and money from the homeless man.

That video caused me to think once again about our reactions to the children coming across the border from Latin American countries. Those children are, for the most part, fleeing violent gangs who have either inflicted violence on them or threatened them with violence. Those gangs are related to the drug trade that is directly related to the drugs we buy in America. These youngsters are not really looking for jobs but for sanctuary. That makes them refugees rather than illegal immigrants.

When we look around the world, we see that there are very poor countries such as Lebanon and Jordan that have accepted hundreds of thousands of refugees over the past few years and continue to do so. Many of those refugees come from wars that we in the United States have participated in. We urge these small countries to do their part to take in these refugees since we refuse to do so and because it is their duty.

Now the shoe is on the other foot, so to speak. But we are not being very good hosts. We are turning out in droves to turn these kids back. We forget that the states that form the border they are crossing once belonged to Mexico.

We took those states in a war begun by our own immigrants who crossed into Mexico in the 1800s. It just seems to me that we could be a little more generous in our welcome.